After years as a prisoner in the Bastille, Dr. Manette is reunited with his daughter in England. There, two men – an exiled French aristocrat and a disreputable but brilliant English lawyer – are joined through their love for Lucie Manette.

From tranquil London, the action moves to the bloodstained streets of Paris at the height of the Reign of Terror, and soon all fall under the lethal shadow of La Guillotine.